Rice president one of nation's highest paid

Rice University President David Leebron﻿ is the highest-paid private college president in Texas.

Photo: Michael Paulsen, Staff

Rice University, considered a Southern Ivy by some, is in league with the elite Northeastern schools by at least one measure: how well it has paid its president.

David Leebron made more than most Ivy League leaders, including the presidents of Yale, Harvard and Princeton, in 2012, according to a new study of private school compensation by the Chronicle of Higher Education. In fact, Leebron earned more than 99 percent of other presidents in The Chronicle's survey.

Leebron was the seventh highest-paid private-school president in the country, the study shows. He made more than $1.5 million in total compensation in 2012, with a base salary of $795,395 - five times the average salary of full professors at Rice.

The Chronicle's list is based on 2012 data, the latest publicly available from private universities, which detail compensation in federal tax filings. Rice did not provide updated salary information, but the university said Leebron jumped to seventh on the list from 34th the year before because of a large payout in deferred compensation "that was offered to him over several years as an incentive to lead Rice into the next century and to accomplish the ambitious agenda supported by the Rice Board of Trustees."

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Top-earning private college presidents

According to the Chronicle of Higher Education, the top 10 earners among private college presidents in 2012 were:

9) Marc Tessier-Lavigne, The Rockefeller University, New York, $1.4 million

10) Richard C. Levin**, Yale University, Connecticut, $1.4 million

*A large portion of Jackson's compensation in 2012 came from the payout of nearly $5.9 million that had been set aside over 10 years as a retention incentive.

**As of June 2012, no longer president at that institution.

Source: Associated Press

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The Chronicle reports that Leebron made $574,191 more in total compensation in 2012 than in 2011 and that his base pay increased by $6,802 from 2011 to 2012.

Schools often set aside thousands to pay presidents later in an effort to hold onto leaders for a longer period of time. If the presidents leave before the designated time, they don't get the payout.

"The people near the top often receive these big payouts," said Jack Stripling, a senior reporter for The Chronicle of Higher Education. "It's just an indication that college boards will tell you they perceive presidents at top-tier schools to be real hot commodities and that they need to go to incredible lengths to make sure they retain these folks."

Shirley Ann Jackson, the president of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, N.Y., topped the list, bringing in $7.1 million in total compensation - about $6 million of which was deferred compensation payouts, Stripling said.

Leebron was by far the most highly compensated private school president in Texas, earning nearly $400,000 more in total compensation than Victor Boschini Jr., the Texas Christian University leader. Boschini was the second-highest paid in Texas but landed at 23rd in the nation. Boschini's base pay, however, was considerably higher than Leebron's, at $930,077.

The presidents of the University of Pennsylvania and Columbia University, where Leebron was law school dean before moving to Houston, were the only Ivy League leaders to make more than Leebron. Penn's Amy Gutmann landed at fourth on the list, making $2.5 million, and Columbia President Lee Bollinger's $3.4 million put him third.

Houston universities pay their leaders well. University of Houston president Renu Khator, who is also chancellor of the UH system, is one of the most highly compensated public school presidents - and the top-earning female - in the nation, another Chronicle of Higher Education list released earlier this year showed.

Khator is wrapping up the second year of a three-year contract with an annual base salary of $700,000 and an annual deferred salary of $200,000. She also received a $150,000 renewal bonus when she signed the contract in 2012 and gets an annual $100,000 retention bonus, with an additional $50,000 contingent on performance.

Leebron's compensation accounted for .28 percent of Rice's expenses, according to the Chronicle report.

Rice has grown in just about every way during Leebron's decade at the helm. The university has been on a building spree, spending $800 million on construction and renovation projects. Its undergraduate student body has grown by 30 percent. And Rice has expanded its reach in the arts, adding installments on campus and building a new Moody Center for the Arts.

Leebron also led the school through its largest-ever capital campaign, which raised $1.1 billion.

Tuition, meanwhile, has nearly doubled during Leebron's tenure to $39,880. The Chronicle notes it would take 40 students paying full sticker price at Rice to pay Leebron's full compensation.

Benjamin Wermund covers higher education for the Houston Chronicle, reporting on universities and colleges in Southeast Texas and across the state. Before coming to Houston, Ben covered K-12 education in Austin and 13 other Central Texas districts for the Austin American-Statesman, where he had been a reporter since Sept. 2011. Prior to that, he was a reporter for the Big Bend Sentinel in Marfa, Texas, and a stringer for Thomson Reuters. A Leander native, he graduated with a journalism degree from the University of Texas at Austin, where he was managing editor of The Daily Texan.